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OIT has set her FREE

My daughter was diagnosed just before she turned 2 years old with a severe life threatening peanut allergy. To learn that your child could die at any moment from even trace amounts of peanut, changes your word completely. I began to immediately research what a peanut allergy meant for my child and how to keep her safe. She grew up knowing she could NOT eat many foods that we all ate, and she became fearful of food, peanuts, and reactions. She was upset at parties, she wanted to be like everyone else. She went to special peanut free preschool and private kindergarten to keep her safe.

We were initially told there was no treatment and to just strictly avoid peanuts and food that could contain traces of peanuts. It was very scary for me as her mother to imagine her as an older child, or teenager. When she is little I can control a lot of where she goes, what she eats, etc. But as she gets older I have to let her take over and I know a lot of accidental deaths form allergies happen in the teen and young adult years. That scared me to death.

I learned of OIT from a friend, and I began researching. I still wasn’t sure if it was the right path for my child. I was so full of fear and anxiety, at this point she was nearing 6 years old, we had spent about 4 years in fear of the dreaded peanut. How could we all now just shift gears and trust that PEANUT would be the very thing to save my child?

Luckily, our trusted and beloved allergist, Dr. Atul Shah in Shirley NY (now also Centereach NY) was about to open a new facility and he was going to be offering OIT! I was beyond excited. I knew that if Dr. Shah was going to offer OIT, that it was safe to do for my daughter. In fact, she was his VERY FIRST patient to start, and also to complete peanut OIT!

She had very few issues with the OIT process, nothing that she couldn’t easily overcome. Fast forward to now, as she has graduated from peanut OIT, her life is so much different! She gets to go to parties and eat what everyone else eat, she is in school and the other kids eat peanut butter right next to her and there is no worry. She has attended camp, parties, vacations, all things that would have been fearful of in the past. She ate Chinese food for the first time in her life and loved it. So many things that she gets to enjoy now, candies and Halloween!

But for me as her mom, and for her dad and the rest of the family, what we all really enjoy is less fear. Dramatically less fear for her life. She is safe now, she can grow up and be a care free teen, and go to sleepovers and parties, and I will know she will be ok. OIT has set her free, and it has set us all free.